Spy Classroom - Volume 3 - Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Schism

Thea thought back.

She reflected on their fight with Corpse—and how during it, the girls’ sole job had been to run away.

They expected Corpse to surface so he could assassinate a major politician, and the girls’ job was to find him and immediately use their radios to report his location to Klaus. Their orders were to simply observe until Klaus showed up, and if Corpse spotted them, to get away from him. That said, they couldn’t afford to flee the scene entirely. If they did that, Corpse would go to ground and massacre innocent civilians to cover his tracks.

They wouldn’t be fighting Corpse directly, but it was still a dangerous job.

The first one to make contact was Thea.

They were at a popular summer getaway filled with gorgeous villas, and it was there that she spotted Corpse through her binoculars.

Teach’s guess was right on the money. Sure enough, here he is.

Corpse’s target must have been a politician at their vacation home.

Impatience and excitement welled up within her. She’d really done it. She was the one who’d found Corpse.

A moment later, though, that feeling of pride was the furthest thing from her mind.

Corpse turned her way.

Her heartbeat quickened.

It can’t be… There’s almost seven hundred feet between us!

She had gotten sloppy. She knew that Klaus could have spotted her from that distance, but that fact had completely slipped her mind.

Corpse dashed straight toward her. There were all manners of villas and roadside trees blocking his way, but any hope Thea had that they might buy her some time was quickly dashed. He merely used them as footholds to accelerate faster.

He wants to catch me so he can make me talk.

Thea started running.

Her mind raced with the information on her friends’ prep work that she’d drilled into her memory. Erna had told her about a series of unstable cliffs and easy-to-knock-over walls, and Annette had told her the locations of the myriad traps she’d set.

However, Corpse was no slouch. He avoided all of Erna’s pitfalls and Annette’s bombs like it was nothing.

“So weak.”

He caught up with Thea in what felt like no time at all, and the two of them squared off.

The man really was as gaunt as his namesake. His cheekbones barely had any meat on them, and his eye sockets protruded from his face like embossed carvings. Thoughts of death flashed through her mind at his sickly appearance, and a shudder ran through her body.

She unconsciously took a step back.

“You’re trying to back down? Now?” Corpse snickered. “Pathetic.”

Thea bit her lip.

He was right. Due to the brick walls surrounding the villa, retreat had never been an option.

“Ugh, what a bore. Why does no one ever give me a decent fight? There’s no sport in killing people like you.” Corpse readied his knife and approached her.

There was no way Thea could use her ability on him in a situation like this, and Erna’s and Annette’s powers had been rendered useless as well.

She tried to ready her gun, but her knees were shaking so badly she couldn’t get a bead on him.

There was only one girl who even stood a chance against him.

“Yikes. Nice face you got there.”

Monika popped up atop the villa roof with a pithy quip and immediately opened fire.

Corpse leaped to the side on reflex and turned toward Monika, but then something unbelievable happened.

The shots ricocheted.

When Monika’s bullets hit the brick outer wall, they bounced back and flew at Corpse from behind. Making them do that would have been a superhuman feat all on its own, but on top of that, she’d also made sure to draw his attention away from them with her insult.

“Now, you—you I like.”

However, all the shots did was graze his shoulder. Somehow, Corpse had sensed the ricochets coming.

Thea could tell that both Monika, who had attacked her opponent by reflecting her shots, and Corpse, who had managed to dodge them anyway, were far out of her league.

Monika rubbed the back of her neck. “Never thought I’d be getting compliments from my opponent.”

“For all your skills, though…” Somehow, Corpse was holding a gun. None of them had seen him draw it. “…you’re still soft.”

He fired a series of ultra-rapid quick-draw shots at Monika. Not only had he taken seemingly no time at all to draw his weapon, he hadn’t taken any time lining up his shots, either. His perfectly polished assassination technique didn’t have a single wasted movement to it.

“Rgh!”

Monika dodged the bullets by the slimmest of margins and took cover behind the brick chimney.

“Sorry, but you’re no match for me. There’s only one man who can take me on, and that’s Bonfire.” He sounded almost depressed. “I mean, what’s the point? My apprentice called me up, and the way I hear it, Bonfire’s nowhere around. He’s off at some Uwe Appel politician guy’s mansion. Sucks to be me, I guess. Ah, I wanna die.”

Corpse shook his head in disappointment. He had fallen for their misdirection hook, line and sinker.

Monika stuck her head out from behind the chimney with a provocative grin. “Well, well, well. Sounds like Grete’s holding up all right on her end, too.”

“Huh?”

Monika raised her hand and pointed at the sky. “Try looking up.”

Corpse turned his head upward as though irresistibly compelled. And the moment he did—

“Oh wait, I meant to the side.”

—a hitherto unseen figure came barreling toward him with animalistic speed and drove their foot into his face as hard as they could.

It was Klaus.

After racing toward Corpse faster than the naked eye could track, Klaus gave him a picturesque high kick. Corpse’s body flew effortlessly through the air and crashed hard into the brick wall.

“BONFIRE!” Corpse roared as he spat up blood. “I’ve waited years for this moment—for the man worthy of being my rival!”

Without even bothering to fix his stance, Corpse leveled his gun at Klaus. It was the same outrageously fast quick-draw technique he had used moments earlier. With barely six feet between them—practically point-blank—he fired.

A small metallic clang rang out.

Klaus was holding a knife. There were no injuries anywhere on him.

“What…?”

As Corpse stared in befuddlement, he ate a second kick right to the temporal region.

He crumpled to the ground, unconscious. His eyes rolled back in his head.

Thea’s memories turned. Now that she thought about it, Klaus’s mentor Guido had performed a similar technique where he deflected bullets with his sword. It made perfect sense that Klaus would have learned the same trick.

“Ah, so that’s what I should’ve done…,” Monika murmured. She sounded a little chagrined.

Klaus waved her down unconcernedly. “No, that was magnificent. Good job surviving.”

“You sure it was the right call, taking him out that quick?” Monika asked. “Sounded like he had something he wanted to say about ‘rivals’ and ‘fate bringing you together’ or something.”

“I don’t recall agreeing to any of that.”

Klaus looked down at Corpse in irritation. The two of them had been on different pages in that regard.

Erna and Annette stuck their heads out from behind the villa, then helped each other carry a large suitcase over.

Klaus took it, folded Corpse’s body up, and stuffed it inside.

“…Aren’t you going to kill him?” Thea asked.

According to the brief, their mission was to assassinate him. Did Klaus want to bring him to a secondary location first?

“Allow me to explain.” Klaus slammed the suitcase shut. “Although we’re given orders to kill when we’re dealing with foes as dangerous as him, the best-case scenario is actually if we’re able to capture them alive. The more skilled a spy, the more valuable the information they’ll have is. Our job now is to hand him off to a specialist team so they can interrogate him. They’ll make him take truth serum, as well as torture him if necessary.”

“He’s going to be tortured…?”

“Burn this memory into your mind. When an operative gets captured, all that awaits them is a darkness deeper than death.”

The look in Klaus’s eyes was as cold as ice. There was a hardness to his gaze that he rarely showed.

A faint chill ran across Thea’s skin.

“There’s no way out for them. Either their hearts give out first, and their minds shatter, or their bodies can’t handle the torture, and they die. There are rare instances of people getting spared when they volunteer to serve as double agents…”

Klaus’s voice deepened to emphasize his final statement.

“…but those traitors just meet death at their old comrades’ hands.”

Those words were no doubt meant as a warning.

He was reminding them that during their next international mission, getting captured wasn’t an option.

However, none of them could have imagined that his words would end up hitting home in a completely different way so soon afterward.

“After all, it’s our job to hand her over to the military, right?”

Monika’s words reminded Thea of what Klaus had just taught them about what happened to captured spies. About the merciless torture that awaited them.

Her body moved on its own.

As Monika picked up the receiver, Thea ripped the phone’s cord out of the wall.

“Hold on, now! Do you even realize what it is you’re doing?!” Thea cried.

“You stole the words right out of my mouth. Do you?”

Thea and Monika glared daggers at each other as they stood in their fancy hotel room. They knew that Erna and Annette were silently watching them from the side, but they didn’t exactly have the bandwidth to spare worrying about them.

Thea grabbed Monika by the collar. “You’re seriously planning on turning Matilda in?!”

Monika’s expression was as composed as could be. “Of course I am. She’s a spy who sneaked into our borders. In case you forgot, that makes her our enemy.”

“But she’s Annette’s mother!”

“And you think that pardons her crimes?” Monika spat.

She was right. The Galgad Empire had been using spies to invade their nation, and even just recently, they had sent the heartless assassin Corpse over to do his murderous work on their soil. Just like Corpse, Matilda posed a potential threat to the Republic. The four of them had a duty to neutralize her.

All that said, though…

Thea glanced back and took a look at Annette’s expression. She appeared just as shocked as the rest of them. Her ever-present smile was gone, and her eyes were as wide as dinner plates.

“Look, we were always gonna have to tell Annette sooner or later.” Monika, having sensed what Thea was thinking, let out a laugh. “If you wanna shout at me for how I did it, you’re barking up the wrong tree.”

She stooped down to escape Thea’s grasp, then swept Thea’s legs out from under her. Thea crumpled to the ground without even getting a chance to catch herself.

“Get your act together.” Monika straightened her collar back out. “Look, all I’m doing is discussing the situation with Klaus. That’s what subordinates are supposed to do, right? Surely you can’t fault me for that.”

“But if you do that…”

That was no compromise. It was forcing the conclusion.

“And then if Teach tells you to, you’re going to turn Matilda in?”

“Well, yeah. I mean, we wouldn’t even have to do anything. We could just call up the army and tell them where she is.”

“So you would send her mom off to get tortured to death, and you want Annette to just accept that?!”

“…Yes?”

The flippant way Monika said it caused a seething rage to boil up inside Thea.

Why did she have to be so uniquely talented at rubbing people the wrong way? There was something fundamentally messed up about her as a person.

Right as Thea was about to give in to her anger and verbally tear Monika a new one, someone else’s voice cut in.

“It’ll…it’ll be okay, I’m sure it will!”

It was Erna.

Her eyebrows were contorted, and she looked like she was on the verge of tears.

“I’m sure Teach will be able to think up some wonderful way for us to get through this. Some way where you two don’t have to fight.”

“See, Erna gets it.” Monika clapped her hands. “You heard her. It’ll be ‘wonderful.’ I mean, this is Klaus we’re talking about. He’ll be able to come up with some perfect solution that none of us could’ve ever dreamed of.”

“Oh, get real!” Thea bellowed, unable to hold back her anger any longer.

Erna’s shoulders twitched.

“There’s no proof of that, and you both know it.”

What they were describing was possible, that much was true. There was a chance that Klaus would come up with an idea that would leave everyone happy. Oh, what a pleasant future that would be.

But…what if he didn’t?

She remembered his eyes when he gazed down at Corpse.

Thea knew that Klaus cared about his teammates. However, she also knew that the proper thing for spies to do was mercilessly interrogate their captured foes.

Klaus might let Matilda live, but he just as easily might have her killed. There was no way of knowing which way he’d lean.

In all their time at Lamplight, they’d never had to deal with a situation this delicate before. Thea couldn’t predict what Klaus would do.

That meant that relying on him wasn’t an option.

“Then, what would you have us do? Just look the other way?” Monika laughed scornfully. “I mean, I guess that’d be fine. With the way things are going, I’d say there’s a good chance the army finds her for us anyway.”

Thea gasped.

Monika had a point. The city was practically crawling with soldiers, and they all had their eyes peeled for Matilda.

It was only a matter of time before she got taken in, and when it came to dealing with spies, there was little difference between the Foreign Intelligence Office and the army. Either one would be perfectly happy to torture Matilda to death.

“And before you go saying anything stupid, let me remind you of something,” Monika continued. “If you try to help Matilda out, that’d make you a traitor to the state. And by extension, a traitor to Lamplight.”

“………”

“I guess you’re not my biggest priority, though.”

As Thea faltered over her response, Monika turned her gaze over to the girl who’d been silent through the entire discussion.

“Annette, you get it, right?”

Hearing her name did nothing to shake the stony expressionlessness from Annette’s face. “I…”

Her lips moved.

“I………”

She started to say something but trailed off. It didn’t look like she was going to finish her sentence.

Thea couldn’t bear to watch.

Monika was forcing her to make a terrible decision—whether she was prepared to sacrifice her own mother.

“That’s enough.” Thea stepped in front of Annette. “Look, we know you’re right, but this? This is just cruel. You think you can pile all that on her, and she’ll just nod along and give you the go-ahead?”

“Fine. For Annette’s sake, you get one day.”

Monika heaved a bored-sounding sigh, then began getting her things together to head out.

She was probably doing it to gather more intel. It wasn’t like she had the social graces to be excusing herself out of concern for others, after all.

“But tomorrow night, I’m making that call. That’s your time limit.”

The following night was when they were scheduled to head back to base. That was their deadline in more ways than one.

“Thea, Annette, I’m trusting you’ll make the proper decision as spies.”

Monika’s final words had a chill to them that ran across Thea’s throat like a knife.

“Traitors or not, it’d leave a bad taste in my mouth to have to kill a teammate.”

That marked a first for Thea—the first time an ally had ever threatened her life.

After Monika left the room, Thea let out a long breath. She sat down in a nearby chair and hung her head.

How did things get like this…?

As far as she could recall, all her decisions had been fine.

She’d been doing her best. She had brought Annette and her mother together out of a desire to bring Annette happiness, but it had advanced Lamplight’s needs at the same time. She’d been giving it her utmost to uphold her pride as a spy and to protect the country that her idol so loved.

Her, a traitor? It didn’t make a lick of sense.

And how is it that Monika always seems to get the better of me?

The frustration she felt was simple envy.

She knew it was an ugly emotion—and misdirected, to boot—but that didn’t stop her from feeling it.

How was it that she worked tirelessly for the sake of the team, and yet that aloof girl was always able to find so much more success?

Thea shook her head to clear it of those useless thoughts.

“……………Annette.” Even she could tell how exhausted her own voice sounded. “Everything Monika just said is true. This is your choice to make. Asking Teach what to do would be a good decision, but if we do that, there’s a chance you’ll never be able to see Matilda again. What is it that you want to do?”

The only one who could decide what would make Annette happy was Annette herself.

Thea still felt as strongly about that now as she had before.

“I…”

When Annette opened her mouth to speak, it was with none of her usual bombastic energy. And who could blame her?

“…I want to see Matilda again, yo.”

Hearing her answer filled Thea with renewed conviction in the choice she’d made.

If Annette had said “I dunno” or “Either way’s fine,” Thea would have been crestfallen.

Now, though, she knew that something was starting to sprout in Annette’s heart. Her reunion with Matilda had been a stroke of good fortune after all.

“All right. Then, tomorrow morning, I’ll take you to see her.”

She brushed Annette’s hair and gave her a gentle smile.

At long last, Thea finally started feeling calm again.

Erna was trembling over in the corner, and Thea bowed apologetically to her. “I’m sorry for shouting earlier.”

“Big Sis Thea…”

However, that wasn’t what Erna was so afraid of.

She was afraid because her teary eyes had seen the future that awaited them.

“If Annette says she wants to save her mom…what are you going to do…?”

Thea went silent. She didn’t have a good answer for that.

The hotel Matilda was staying at wasn’t exactly the most reputable establishment around.

A little digging made it clear that its front desk didn’t check their foreign visitors’ passports, nor did they inquire as to the reason they were visiting. After taking payment up front, they were hands-off for the rest of the stay. It was the kind of hotel that attracted problematic patrons, and if Matilda kept staying there, it was only a matter of time until the army found her.

Monika had probably looked up the hotel as well. That must have been what had tipped her off about Matilda’s secret.

Thea called Matilda at her hotel and told her to meet them at a beautiful cobblestone promenade on the coast early the next morning. Aside from passersby out jogging and such, there wouldn’t be that much foot traffic at that hour.

Thea and Annette headed out a fair bit earlier than the arranged time, then used their binoculars to check out the port.

“That’s a whole bunch of soldiers, yo.” Annette gave the report with her usual innocent grin. A night’s sleep had restored her to her normal upbeat self.

“Sure enough, they locked down the port, too…”

It seemed like a lot of effort just to catch a single person.

Was Matilda really that dangerous of a spy? Or was this just the army going overboard?

Thea was still pondering the matter when Matilda arrived.

“Ah, Thea. Good morning.”

“……………Hmm?”

The moment Matilda greeted them, Annette gave her a funny look.

As Thea started wondering why, though, Annette rubbed her tummy and moaned.

“I’m starving, yo. I wanna go to a bakery now.”

Apparently, she was just hungry. Thea and Matilda decided to indulge her.

Annette strode briskly atop the seaside walkway, and the other two followed after her from a few steps back.

“So today’s the day you’re going back to school, right?” Matilda asked. “Thank you for taking such good care of my daughter. Once I finish up my work, I’ll come pay her a visit.” She bowed humbly.

Thea wondered what exactly Matilda meant by “work.”

Trepidation nipped at her, but she couldn’t afford to back out now. She clenched her fists tight to motivate herself.

She didn’t have the time left to spend beating around the bush any longer.

“I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to be blunt. Actually, I’m not sorry. You haven’t been straight with us.” She looked Matilda dead-on. “My friend found your passport, and the name on it wasn’t Matilda.”

“Wh—?”

“Tell me straight up: Are you a foreign spy?”

Matilda’s face went pale. That was answer enough as she started glancing around nervously.

“Don’t worry, I’m not here to turn you in.” Not yet, at least, Thea added silently to herself. “I just need to know what it is you’re actually after.”

There were swarms of soldiers gathered at the station and the port, but they were absent from the seaside promenade that sat between the two.

Thea had chosen that spot so they could talk things out.

“Tell me, Matilda. Who are you, really?”

“I—I should be asking you the same thing. Who exactly are you all?”

“Stop stalling and answer the question.”

“……………Your suspicions were right.” Matilda let out a resigned sigh. “I work as a spy for the Galgad Empire. I didn’t think my alias would work on my daughter, so I introduced myself by my real name. I actually am called Matilda, and what I told you about being separated from her four years ago was all true.”

She went on to tell Thea about how she had originally worked as an Imperial engineer, but when her husband died young and she didn’t have enough money to provide for her daughter, she turned to espionage to make ends meet. She was assigned to work for a foreign manufacturer and to use her position to bring cash to operatives who were on infiltration missions in foreign nations.

“Bringing a young daughter with me helped me avoid drawing suspicion, but I never thought she would end up in a train wreck while we were abroad…”

“So that was what you meant when you said you brought Annette to work with you?”

“It was. After then, when I thought she was dead, I lived like a hollow shell. I kept working as a spy because it seemed like the easiest thing to do. I suppose that’s why it all went wrong.” She laughed self-derisively. “I got my tools stolen, panicked, and now the army has me surrounded. What a week.”

Enemies or not, that was a pretty unfortunate story.

“But, Thea, please don’t get the wrong idea about me.”

“And what idea would that be?”

“I admit that I lied to you about some things, but I really did mean it when I said I thought of being reunited with my daughter as a miracle. I truly do want to take her with me.”

“Why, though? That daughter you loved and Annette are basically two different people.” Thea deliberately posed the question to her in the cruelest way possible. “All her old memories are gone, and four long years have passed since then.”

“It’s not about how long it’s been.” A smile spread across Matilda’s face. “She hasn’t changed a bit. Her personality might be a little different, and she might not remember anything, but she’s still my daughter.” Matilda’s gentle gaze rested on Annette, who was still walking ahead of them.

Annette might have heard her; her head twitched.

Matilda chuckled. “I promise: I’m going to retire as a spy the minute we get back home. We’ll live peaceful lives together, and I’ll never let myself get separated from her again.”

Thea rubbed her fingertips together as she searched for an outlet for the emotions swirling inside her.

This was a happy ending, right? It was everything she could have dreamed of. Annette had no memories of her origin, and yet she would still get to experience a mother’s love. So why did she feel so conflicted? Was it because Matilda was an enemy spy, or was it something else?

There was one question she needed answered.

“Will you? Be able to get back home, I mean.”

“I…”

Matilda exhaled for so long it must have used up every last drop of air in her lungs.

“…What am I going to dooo?”

“Aren’t you supposed to be a spy?”

“I’m just a lowly smuggler. I mean, I’ve never even killed anyone… I sent more distress calls back home than I can count, but they just ignored them… I think they’re leaving me to die.”

Her voice had a sort of hollow resignation to it.

“But the thing is, I can’t put it off any longer. Tomorrow, I’m going for an all-or-nothing gambit. The longer I wait, the more likely the army is to find me.” She clenched her fists tight. “But if there’s a chance I can live together with my daughter once this is over, it’ll make it all worth it.”

Thea’s reply was flat and listless. “………Is that so?”

Thea declined to go into the bakery with them, insisting she didn’t have much of an appetite. She sat down on a bench outside and sighed, then watched the mother-daughter pair from afar as they happily shared their bread.

At that point, she realized that her knees were shaking.

She was afraid. Afraid that what she was about to do would be a terrible mistake.

This would have all been so much easier if Matilda were a bad person. God, I’m the worst for even thinking that…

Matilda was trapped on all sides. At this rate, she really would end up getting tortured and killed.

But then, if Thea tried to help her…

…Monika will kill me…for being a traitor.

“Differences between allies are the key to a strong team.”

Those had been Klaus’s exact words. Or rather, they had been Hearth’s, but Klaus was the one who’d repeated them.

That can’t possibly be true, though. When people have wildly different values, their team just ends up crumbling.

Thea wondered what could have possibly been going through that crimson-haired spy’s head when she made that statement.

If it were you, Ms. Hearth, what would you do?

Her thoughts turned.

Once again, she thought of her idol—the woman who had led Klaus as Inferno’s boss.

The girl was the daughter of a well-known newspaper company’s president.

Over the hundred-plus years since the Industrial Revolution, the newspaper had prospered into a major powerhouse. It was the second-oldest paper in Din, and it had a huge readership among well-educated conservatives. Left-wing groups calling for drastic reforms rose to prominence after the war, and the way the paper lambasted them played a meaningful role in driving public discourse.

That was what led to the kidnapping. At the time, the girl was eleven years old.

The newspaper had influence on par with the radio, and the girl’s father held enough public trust that his stances swayed the opinions of the masses. That was more than enough reason for foreign spies to want to target the girl.

When they did, she got a taste of true despair.

The girl was held in captivity for over two weeks, and she spent the entire time being treated like an animal in a cage. After being stripped of all her possessions, she was tossed on the cold floor in nothing but her undergarments. The room smelled foul. That was due to the bucket in the corner, which was the only place she had to do her business. For the first little while, the man in charge of feeding her would run his gaze over her bare limbs with a vulgar smile, but it wasn’t long before even he began averting his gaze from her and started just dumping some bread and water into her room once a day. Two weeks of not bathing made a person pretty hard on the eyes.

I want to die.

She had been born with a silver spoon in her mouth, and the suffering was too much for her to bear.

Outside her room, she could hear them speaking in a language she didn’t recognize. She must have been taken all the way to another country, so she had little hope that her nation’s soldiers or police would be coming for her. Her motherland’s influence couldn’t reach that far.

It’s all over for me.

Around the time she ran out of tears to shed, she noticed someone watching her from outside the room. She could hear some sort of conversation. It sounded like a boy and a woman, but she couldn’t make out what they were saying. However, it wasn’t like it mattered much. She would be dead soon anyway. She simply shut her eyes.

The next moment, there was a roar so thunderous it seemed to practically turn the world on its head.

The girl was shocked.

A short while later, the door to her room swung open with a crimson-haired woman standing on the other side. Her hair was long and flowing, and between that and its vivid hue, it looked almost like her head was ablaze. It wasn’t clear how old she was, but she was certainly beautiful.

“________”

The girl stared in astonishment. Not just at the woman, but at the grisly spectacle behind her, too.

Ten bodies lay mangled on the ground.

The faces of the men who’d imprisoned her had all been crushed, obliterated by some sort of overwhelming force. The man who had looked to be their leader had a crowbar running straight through his head.

The crimson-haired woman spoke to her.

“You’re little ______, right?”

Despite the ghastly scene the woman was standing amid, there wasn’t so much as a drop of blood on her. The girl couldn’t help but feel calmer.

She gave the woman a small nod.

“Great! Now, my friends are busy storming the bad guys’ secret hideout as we speak. There was probably a mastermind who orchestrated the kidnapping, so until we find them, you’ll have to stay with us.”

The girl was silent.

“Can you not talk?”

She shook her head.

“Ah. Shock from the kidnapping, I’ll bet.”

A nod.

“Okay, try thinking of a sentence in your head. Anything is fine.”

What is she talking about?

“‘What is she talking about?’—that’s the kind of face you’re making. Did I get it?”

Huh?!

“Luckily, this isn’t my first rodeo. A couple years back, a teammate of mine took in a kid who couldn’t read, write, or hold a decent conversation. When we first met, I had to communicate with him by reading his expression the same way.”

Oh, huh.

“Of course, I ended up spoiling him so much that he still sucks at holding conversations, but you live and learn.”

What an odd woman. Despite the extreme situation they were in, just hearing her talk helped steady the girl’s nerves.

“………”

The crimson-haired woman looked quizzically at the girl.

“We end up learning to read expressions as a sort of occupational hazard, but you’ve got some sort of special skill, too, don’t you?”

Wow, she figured me out. If I look in someone’s eyes, I can see into their heart a bit.

“Whoa, that’s some incredible stuff.”

But I don’t use it much. People would think I was creepy.

“Then, do you want to look into mine?”

Can I?

“I mean, you’re curious, aren’t you? You want to know who it is you’re dealing with.”

The crimson-haired woman crouched down in front of the girl and looked her in the eye. The girl was completely filthy, but the woman didn’t let that bother her.

After three seconds, it was the girl who ended up surprised.

You have a really pretty heart.

“Wow, that’s so sweet of you.”

What the girl had sensed in the woman was ambition of the noblest sort and a heart full of compassion for others.

Who are you? How were you able to find me?

The crimson-haired woman gave her a small smile.

“I’m a spy. And there’s nowhere I wouldn’t go and nothing I wouldn’t do to protect you.”

And that was how Hearth and the girl who would come to be called Thea first met.

From there, the girl was moved to a safe house where she spent the next ten days together with the woman.

The woman was supposedly part of a larger team, but for some reason, none of her allies ever showed themselves around the girl. The girl occasionally heard them arguing outside her room, so there were definitely at least a few of them, but none of them ever came to see her. The crimson-haired woman was the only person who ever looked after her.

Whenever the girl got bored, the woman would come and regale her with tales of spycraft.

Confidential or not, she told the girl everything—about the shadow war, about the group called Inferno, about the missions they took on, and about how quickly the silent boy they’d taken in three years earlier had grown up.

Thea often had questions, and the woman answered them all. Despite Thea not saying a word, the woman was skilled enough to be able to figure out her questions anyway.

Why do you choose to work as a spy?

The crimson-haired woman stroked her chin in thought for a moment before answering.

“To advance war along to its next stage, I guess.”

I don’t get it.

Isn’t the war over?

“No, not by a long shot. It’s impossible to free humanity from war. The destiny of all living creatures is to seek conflict. But see, for us humans, it’s possible to change what war looks like.”

How?

“By changing the rules. War is kind of like a game, in that it has to be played in a certain way. People have been editing those rules all throughout history. That’s what gave us concepts like territory and borders. That’s what gave us sovereign nations. Treaties. International laws. When humankind wages its wars, it does so within those frameworks.”

Kind of like a sport?

“Putting it that simply might be a little disrespectful to people who’ve died in wars, but basically, yes. And when people get sick of fighting, they decide on new rules. The end of the Great War marked the beginning of wars fought with spies. Someday, war will change again, and people will fight and fight and fight and fight until they can fight no more.”

The crimson-haired woman licked her lips.

“But if we spies stop fighting, then we’ll end up returning to that era of indiscriminate death and slaughter.”

You mean that if you stop fighting, the Great War will start up again?

“That’s right. And it’s my job to stop that from happening.”

Wow. So you’re saving the world.

“Yep. But to tell you the truth, I didn’t want to be a spy. What I really wanted to be was a hero.”

Why’s that?

“Because spies only end up saving people from their own countries. But heroes—heroes can save so much more than that.”

The woman’s voice sounded so proud that before the girl noticed, she was speaking, too.

Her vocal cords trembled ever so quietly. “I want… I want to be like you, too.”

“Oh, look, you’re back to talking again.” Then the crimson-haired woman squinted at her. “Wait, are you mimicking my voice?”

It felt like I would be able to speak again if I used your voice to do it.

Does this mean I’m more like you now…?

“……………”

She was worried the woman would think she was mocking her. Was she going to get mad?

The woman gave her a profound nod and patted her head.

“With your talents, you’re going to end up surpassing me someday.” Her words flowed eloquently. “We don’t have much more time left together, but why don’t I give you some hands-on tutoring?”

In that moment, the warmth from the woman’s hand was the girl’s everything.

As she sat reminiscing on the past, Thea felt a smile crawl across her face.

She seemed really nice at the time, but thinking back now, she was kind of intense, too…

Thea had grown a fair bit since then, but even now she still didn’t fully understand the woman’s beliefs. She had gone on and on about conflict, and even though she was full of love, she didn’t hesitate to kill when she needed to. Deep in her heart, though, her sole desire was to save as many people as possible. Thea wondered how she had reconciled that contradiction.

Thinking of her always filled Thea’s heart with aspiration. The way she shouldered all that responsibility, constantly pushing forward to carry out her ideals… It stirred Thea’s heart.

Kindness and platitudes alone could never change the world. You needed courage, and that was something Thea knew she lacked.

“Yo, Sis.”

Thea had been so lost in her memories that she barely noticed Annette standing right in front of her.

She was done chatting with Matilda, and the latter was waving good-bye to her and Thea from off in the distance. The mother-daughter bonding time had reached its conclusion.

“I got you a reward.”

Annette stuffed something into Thea’s mouth.

It tasted like a chocolate pastry. She must have gotten it to go from the bakery.

“Thanks, Sis. I confer unto you the highest of praises, yo.”

Thea had to hurriedly gulp down the pastry before she ended up choking on it. “You’re…welcome? I take it this means your conversation went well?”

“Yep, and it’s all thanks to you.”

Annette gleefully plopped herself down right beside Thea. Matilda was almost too far away to see, but Annette had yet to take her eyes off of her.

“You know, Annette…”

“Yeah?”

“Once I was actually separated from my parents, too. It was only for four weeks for me, but still.”

Compared to what Annette had been through, that hardly even registered. There were probably plenty of girls in Lamplight who’d gone through far more hardships than she had.

However, the lonely fear she felt back then still stung.

Just as the light from the hero who saved her lingered in her heart, so, too, did that painful emotion.

“What about it, yo?”

“…Nothing, I suppose.”

Annette didn’t need to hear her story. There was no reason to force her to listen.

Annette’s situation and Thea’s past didn’t have anything to do with each other.

“I would like to hear your answer, though.” Thea took Annette’s hands in hers. “What is it you want to do? Do you want to save Matilda, or do you—?”

Angry shouts rose up from over by the main road.

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see emergency vehicles and police officers rushing as fast as they could.

Did something happen? What could it be, I wonder?

It wasn’t anything worth panicking over.

In a city like this, monstrous crimes were a fairly regular occurrence.

“……”

Annette’s eyes were as wide as saucers.

Thea immediately realized what she was so alarmed about.

“It’s okay, Annette.” She gently rubbed her teammate’s hand. “That’s not the direction of Matilda’s hotel.”

“………”

“There’s nothing to worry about. I’m sure she’s fine.”

Hearing Annette’s silence was enough to give Thea her answer. Annette had no desire to abandon Matilda to her fate.

Thea stroked her head. “You should just go ahead and do whatever it is you want to do.”

“Sis—” For a moment, the words refused to come out. “Why are you doing all this for me, yo?”

There were plenty of answers that came to mind.

After all, Monika had asked her the same question—though, in her case, it was with a good deal more exasperation.

Was it because they were teammates? To live up to an ideal? Basic deference to societal norms?

No, it wasn’t any of that. Thea couldn’t explain away her actions with anything nearly so neat or tidy.

“Because when I look at you, it makes me want to have your back.”

That feeling welled up from deep inside her. She couldn’t have ignored it if she’d wanted to.

“Now, can you tell me what you want? You can be as selfish as you’d like, I promise.”

Annette sucked in a big breath.

“I wanna save my mom, yo!”

Thea gave the shouted answer a big nod. “All right. I’ll work something out, then.”

That was a big decision Annette had just made. A choice far harsher than any fourteen-year-old should have to shoulder.

That meant the rest was up to Thea.

She was going to have to break through the nightmare that was closing in on them and save her teammate the way a hero would.

A series of shops and restaurants sat clustered around the base of a series of mega-hotels.

The ones facing the main street were welcoming and well maintained, but all it took was a single step into the side alleys before the establishments one found became decidedly seedier. One moment, you could be passing by a nightclub that catered to excited tourists, and the next, you found yourself standing in front of a sketchy “pharmacy” with your nose assailed by the smell of the countless discarded cigarettes lining the wayside.

Even in the wee hours of the night, finding a store with its lights still on was a trivial affair. There were plenty of people out and about, some of them trying to win over women in bars and others making the bets of their lives in underground casinos.

Thea felt an odd sort of empathy toward them.

She slipped out of the hotel and headed down the road alongside Monika.

That night, they had chosen to lodge at a much cheaper establishment than the first-class hotel they’d been staying at previously. Part of it was because they were trying to lay low, but the decision had come about largely on account of the sorry state of their wallets. Despite the fact that they were a pair of teenage girls slinking about in the dead of night, nobody paid them a second thought.

Monika glared at her. “Just how far do you plan on taking me?”

A mere ten minutes prior, Monika had out-and-out threatened her.

In their hotel room, she’d held Thea at gunpoint and asked her if she was going to betray Lamplight.

Thea responded by suggesting that they go somewhere else so they didn’t wake Erna and Annette, and the two of them headed away from the nighttime crowd.

Eventually, they reached an abandoned alleyway.

Under the streetlight’s dim glow, Thea spoke. “I want to talk this over.”

The alley sat at about six and a half feet wide in the space between two buildings.

The loud echo from Thea’s voice reverberated off the building walls.

“…Well, that’s disappointing.” Monika stretched her arms toward the sky. “But hey, I guess that’s all you’re good for.”

“The thing is, I don’t think either of us is wrong.” Thea faced Monika as she made her statement. “Both of us have something we refuse to back down on, and both of us are acting in accordance with that belief. I want to save the people who need saving, even if it means bending the rules. You want to do what’s right for the group, and you won’t accept any exceptions to that. Don’t you see? We’re coming at this from different sides, but I think we can both find something to respect in the other.”

“Is that all you wanted to say? ’Cause you still haven’t given me much of a reason to care.” Monika cracked her neck in boredom. “Out with it already. Are you going to turn Matilda in, or are you betraying the team?”

Those were the two nightmarish options Thea had available to her.

Choosing the former would mean discarding Annette’s feelings, and the latter would lead to her own destruction.

There was only one way out.

“I’m choosing the third option.”

“The what?”

“It’s simple. I’m going to make you surrender. All I have to do is shut you up, and then we won’t have to turn Matilda over, and nobody will know about our crime.”

Thea gracefully made her declaration.

“Both of us are right, so there’s only one way forward—we fight it out.”

That was the path she’d chosen.

She was going to defeat Monika with her own two hands.

Even if Monika declined her challenge, she would just attack her anyway.

Thea had come there with the resolve to never back down.

“You get fifty out of a hundred for that answer.” Monika’s lips curled. Her expression was so confident she almost seemed happy. “Good stuff, Thea. This might be the first thing you’ve ever done that I respected.”

She withdrew three rubber balls from her pocket, then held them between the fingers of her right hand as she brandished a knife with her left.

“Woulda been worth another five if you’d just attacked me by surprise. You really think you can take me head-on?” She narrowed her eyes. “Remind me, who was it who let us pass Teach’s test? Who was it who took on Corpse when you were trembling too badly to move? Who was it who figured out who Matilda really was?”

“Obviously I know how strong you are. That’s why I wanted to talk things out—”

“The problem with talking is you only get to do that if you’re in the same league as someone. And you? You’re beneath me.”

“______”

A chill ran down Thea’s spine. It was hard to believe that that intensity was coming from someone around her age.

I really didn’t want to make an enemy out of you.

Monika’s inscrutability didn’t stop at her aloof personality and her prodigious talents.

There was also her special ability—and the fact that Thea had no idea what it was.

Every girl on Lamplight was an extreme specialist. Whether it was poisons, disguises, or stealing, each of them had a skill so honed that not even elite spies could imitate them. And Monika was no exception.

The problem was that Monika had never told them what it was.

She had gone out of her way to keep it a secret from her own teammates, and for some reason, Klaus had allowed her to do so.

That alone was proof enough of how preeminent her skills must be.

Thea smiled, then snapped her fingers. “Then, I hope you don’t mind if I don’t hold back.”

With that, the duel between the two allies began.

Thea’s first move…was to fall back a step and take shelter behind a man.

“Sorry about this, miss. Queen’s orders.”

“Say what?”

All of a sudden, a pair of brawny men had appeared in the back alley with them.

The two were positioned on opposite sides of Monika, trapping her in between. Earlier that afternoon, Thea had used her negotiation skills to recruit them onto her side as muscle. Most of the time, they worked as bodyguards in a gang, and they had lead pipes in their hands alongside their cruel smiles.

“You little…” Monika gave Thea a disparaging look. “Last time I checked, duels weren’t supposed to involve calling in a pair of dudes to beat your opponent up for you.”

“You think I’m going to pull my punches when you’re so obviously out of my league?”

“You’re a filthy slut.”

“I’ll choose to take that as a compliment.”

Thea knew she was no match for Monika in a fight.

To make up for that, she was going to use every trick she had at her disposal. She tenderly caressed one of the men’s backs as she whispered to them.

“Now, I have a special reward in mind for whoever takes her down. Ducky, I’ll be your kindergarten teacher for you and tell you what a good boy you are in baby talk. Bubbles, I’ve got a pair of boots I wore for three days straight just waiting for me to step on you with them. And remember, boys… I’m the only one who knows your deepest, darkest desires, and I’m the only one who can make them all come true.”

The men’s bodies shivered like they’d been struck by lightning. They brandished their lead pipes.

“Gah! I’m surrounded by pervs!” Monika yelped.

The men ignored her and charged at her.

When a pair of men armed with lead pipes attacked them from both sides, most people would be lucky to even escape with their lives.

Aside from the shout, though, Monika was calm. She charged right back at her would-be assailants.

As she did, she hurled her rubber balls at the wall. Their black color allowed them to melt into the darkness and vanish, and the next thing Thea saw were the balls rebounding back and crashing straight into the sides of two men’s heads.

Getting hit from their blind spots caught the men off guard, and Monika took full advantage of the opening that gave her.

She smashed her dagger’s hilt onto the first man’s jaw.

“One down.”

Seeing her fight was like watching a magic trick.

True to her word, Monika’s attack sent the man reeling. He collapsed onto his back, unconscious.

As he did, the other man charged at Monika from behind. However, one of her rubber balls bounced yet again and smashed him right in the face. He lost his balance, allowing Monika to dodge his attack and send him flying with a kick to the flank.

In shock, Thea watched Monika perform her superhuman feats from a safe distance.

How are the balls doing that? They’re so accurate it’s like they’re being pulled by some force…

Annette had made those balls specially for her out of metal cores coated in rubber.

They bounced well, and the damage they could dish out made them a pretty intimidating projectile weapon. There was just one problem with them…

…Accurately hitting people with their rebounds shouldn’t be possible.

If Monika was just throwing them directly at people, that would be one thing, but she wasn’t. The attacks she’d launched at the men’s blind spots had taken at least two bounces to get there.

Thea still didn’t know what her specialty was exactly, but now she at least had a rough idea.

Monika had the ability to accurately calculate angles, trajectories, and timing as well as the aiming skills to put those calculations to use.

“But…the brainpower and fine motor control that must take!”

Her talents exceeded Thea’s wildest expectations.

The man Monika kicked charged valiantly back into the fray.

“For the queen!”

“I don’t want any part of this kinky shit you’ve got going on.”

However, he froze halfway toward her like he’d hit an invisible wall.

His expression was one of complete bewilderment, and Thea didn’t understand what was going on, either.

The alley was shrouded in darkness, but there were thin lines gleaming under its dim streetlight—wires. They were tangled around the man’s arm. Between that and his already-ensnared right arm and left leg, he was rendered immobile.

They must have been attached to the rubber balls. As the balls bounced off the walls and ground, they had laid a net throughout the alley.

All the man could do was struggle like a butterfly caught in a spiderweb.

“And that’s the second.”

Monika smacked her hilt into the man’s chin and downed him the same way she had the first.

It had taken her less than a minute to defeat the both of them.

“Just for the record, is that the only trick you’ve got up your sleeve?” Monika went around and retrieved her rubber balls off the ground. “Because if it is, this isn’t gonna make for much of a fight. Come on, at least use your gun or something.”

“Someone’s certainly feeling high and mighty…”

Thea knew full well that she couldn’t go around firing off shots while the city was crawling with soldiers. And besides, the men were far from the only trick she’d prepared.

She turned her back on her opponent and ran with all her might. She needed to lure Monika after her.

Just as Thea planned, Monika immediately gave chase. There was no way she didn’t realize it was a trap, so her plan must have been to break through it head-on. Her pride refused to allow her to fall back.

In terms of athletic ability, Monika had a considerable edge.

Right when Monika was about to catch up with her, Thea slapped the back of her knife against an exposed water pipe by the side of the street. The tiny impact was enough to cause the pipe to burst, spraying a powerful jet of water directly at Monika.

“______”

She heard Monika click her tongue.

Her foe had no choice but to dodge backward to avoid the blast. “Right. You made Erna into one of your little pawns.”

“‘Collaborators,’ please.”

The pipe had already been on the verge of bursting. Erna knew about all the little seeds of misfortune lying around the city… Although in some cases, she had found out about them firsthand.

“And don’t forget about Annette, too.”

Thea flipped the switch she’d been keeping hidden in her pocket.

The moment she hit the button, the bricks by Monika’s feet—or rather, the bombs that had been made to look like bricks—exploded. Tiny shards of stone shot up at her like a shotgun blast.

Monika responded by flipping her hood like a cloak, deftly parrying the small rocks.

So close. If Monika had just been a little slower, she would have taken a pretty serious blow.

No matter, though. Thea still had bucketloads of traps Erna and Annette had prepared for her.

“The truth is: This fight is three against one. Did you enjoy that taste of Annette’s and Erna’s powers?”

Monika wiped the dust and debris off her hood. “What a pain.”

Thea didn’t feel an ounce of shame about what she was doing.

After all, going around negotiating with people and getting them on her side was simply the way she did battle.

Her preparations were impeccable. She had explosives masquerading as bricks, water pipes that would rupture at the slightest impact, gas weapons hidden in metal barrels, gutters swarming with vicious rats… Thanks to the two powerful allies she’d obtained, her position in that alley was unassailable.

“Look, just surrender. I don’t want to hurt you any more than I have to.”

“Oh? But we were just getting to the good part.” Monika’s expression was utterly unflappable.

Despite the overwhelmingly unfavorable position she was in, she clearly had no intention of surrendering.

“…Honestly, I don’t even know why you’re the one fighting me on this,” Thea murmured in dismay.

The comment wasn’t part of some strategy. Those were her honest feelings.

Never once had Thea felt any passion for espionage from Monika. All she ever did was make cynical comments and belittle her teammates.

“You’re always looking down on us, picking fights, throwing cruel, heartless arguments around…”

Thea glared at her.

“…Why do you even bother staying with Lamplight at all?”

“And why should I have to explain myself to someone weaker than me?”

Thea had meant what she asked, but Monika merely flicked her arm instead of answering. Something slid out of her sleeve and fell into her hand, and she hurled it with utmost efficiency.

Is she going for a ricochet attack again?

Monika had taken the two men out by bouncing rubber balls into their blind spots. Was she planning on repeating the same trick?

I’ve seen it too many times, though. It won’t work on me anymore.

Thea braced herself and slid her hand across her remote.

“That’s enough. If you keep resisting, I’ll have no choice but to activate all the—”

“Too late. I can see ’em all.”

Operating a hair faster than Annette’s bombs could go off, Monika began taking evasive maneuvers.

It was like she could predict the future. There was no other way to put it.

Thea didn’t know what was going on, but she could tell that Monika was doing something new.

She needed to get out of there now.

The moment she turned back around to flee, she spotted something unfamiliar in her peripheral vision.

Is that…a mirror?

That was exactly what it was, and it sat half embedded in the wall.

It hadn’t been there a few seconds ago. That must have been what Monika just threw.

I get it. So that’s how Monika figured out where all the traps—

Then her train of thought was rudely interrupted.

All of a sudden, everything went white. It was light—a powerful flash of light, reflecting off the mirror straight into her eyes.

She calculated the angle to bounce the light off the mirror!

Unable to see, she stopped in her tracks.

The next attack came at her abdomen.

“Game over. You fail on all counts.” Monika, who had finally caught up to her, plunged her fist deep into Thea’s solar plexus.

The remote tumbled out of Thea’s hand, and her body crumpled powerlessly onto the alleyway.

She’s too strong.

There were so many ways she could ricochet her attacks. So many ways she could hunt her foes down. The number of techniques at her disposal was on a whole different level.

Thea was helpless to do anything but clutch her stomach and pant as she tried to endure the pain.

“I wish you’d at least used your gun.” She could hear Monika’s bored voice coming from above her head. “This didn’t even make for decent training.”

“Training…?”

“I’ve been itching to get better. You know, after I lost to Corpse and all.”

Thea couldn’t find any words to reply.

She had been relieved that they got through the mission at all, and yet at the same time, Monika had been frustrated that it hadn’t gone even better.

It’s like she and I exist on different planes altogether.

She gritted her teeth.

After all the prep work she’d put in, she was still no match for Monika.

However, she couldn’t afford to give up just yet.

I have to get away… I underestimated how much better she was than me, and these tricks aren’t going to be enough to beat her…

Still down on her hands and knees, she readied her knife and took a swipe at Monika’s legs. Monika dodged the way Thea knew she would, but at least it kept her at bay.

Thea gathered strength in her legs and rose back to her feet. She needed to put some distance between herself and Monika. Even a little would be better than nothing.

Then she felt something grab her arm as tight as a vice. She felt like she even heard her bones creak a little.

“You think you’re getting away?”

Monika wasn’t about to show mercy.

She yanked Thea’s arm and slammed her against the wall, causing Thea to hit her head. Everything went blurry for a moment, and she collapsed back onto the ground.

Victory was hopeless. Out of all the girls in Lamplight, Monika’s skills were head and shoulders above all the others’.

Grete could give her a run for her money when it came to ingenuity, but as soon as things got physical, she would fold on the spot. Similarly, Sybilla could probably take her in a fair fight, but all Monika needed to beat her was some deception.

She was a top-of-the-class all-rounder with no weaknesses.

She was the strongest girl in Lamplight, the force that allowed their band of washouts to keep striving forward.

She was their unbeatable ace in the hole.

“That’s why I wanted so badly for you to appreciate me.” Before Thea knew it, she was speaking aloud. “After all, I was always the one who appreciated your talents the most…”

“You’re trying to appeal to my emotions now? That’s just sad.”

Thea’s do-or-die attempt at supplication had no effect on her. What else could she do?

If she lost here, Annette’s feelings would be discarded like so much garbage, and Annette’s mother would die.

For Thea, though, there was no guarantee she’d even be able to get back on her feet. Turning the tables was a distant fantasy.

Monika gave her an icy look. “…You still think you can fight? I’m pretty sure we know who the winner is by now. Or what, am I going to have to actually kill you to get it through that thick skull of yours?”

The homicidal energy Monika was giving off chilled Thea to her core.

Her knees trembled, and tears nearly welled up in her eyes.

I just… I need to get away… If I can just catch her in a trap this time, I can—

As her thoughts turned, a dreary voice echoed in her mind.

“You’re trying to back down? Now? …Pathetic.”

It was Corpse, snickering.

And he was right. When faced with a powerful foe, all she’d been able to do was cower in fear.

“God, you’re even soft on yourself.”

Later, Monika had criticized her in much the same way. Sure enough, that was the unvarnished truth. Thea’s mental fortitude was abysmal.

But what choice do I have? Unlike Monika, I’m not even armed.

And her ability wasn’t going to let her close the skill gap, either.

After all, locking eyes for three seconds? Did she really think her opponent was going to give her that kind of time in the middle of a fight?

“If you hone that special talent of yours, you’ll be the strongest spy around.”

Then it was Hearth’s voice she heard in her head.

“…………”

“You need to become a hero.”

Thea bit down on her lip.

She could feel some sort of emotion welling up inside her.

“…You really need to work on your mental fortitude.”

The final voice that echoed within her was Klaus’s.

When her heart had been on the verge of breaking, he had given her a piece of advice.

“Enjoy that discord.”

Now she remembered what he had told her.

“The best approach is to butt heads with your teammates directly.”

“________!”

She roused herself into action.

After summoning the strength to stand, she reached for Monika’s neck with both hands.

“Are you seriously trying to strangle me?”

Her plan to catch Monika by surprise worked. However, Monika easily came up with a counter.

“You’re not beating me in a contest of strength, I can guarantee you that.” Monika snagged both of her wrists out of the air.

Now their arms were linked, leaving them jostling for position with brute force alone.

Thea lacked the power to compete with Monika’s core strength, and her arms stopped short before getting to Monika’s neck. She pushed as hard as she could, but she couldn’t even get close.

“C’mon, slut. Just give up while you’re behind.”

“A hero never gives up.”

As Thea’s arms began to tremble, a small smile flitted across her face.

She knew exactly how she could win.

She needed to do something Monika would never expect, and she needed to butt heads with her directly.

Fortunately, she had a weapon on hand capable of doing both at once. Hearth had told her to hone it, and hone it she had.

“You’re going to regret the day you ever crossed a slut.”

It was time to butt heads. Directly.

The moment Thea’s arms were about to give out, she dropped the hammer.

“I’m code name Dreamspeaker—and it’s time to lure them to their ruin.”

She released all the force she’d been pushing into her arms.

Then she spread them out wide and thrust her head straight at Monika’s face.

But not for a headbutt.

Their noses smashed into each other, and right as they did, Thea planted her lips firmly on Monika’s.

“________!”

Monika’s eyes went wide.

Lovers sometimes closed their eyes when they shared a romantic kiss, but this kiss was anything but. This hijacking of her lips would make anyone’s eyes go wide, especially if the kiss came paired with the pain from a headbutt.

And when that happened, it would invariably provide an opening to meet their gaze!

Even Monika couldn’t help but get thrown for a loop. Her body went stiff.

A few moments later, she started to thrash about, but Thea used every drop of strength in her body to hold her teammate’s head still.

Eventually, Monika summoned up enough power to forcefully shove Thea off her. Thea slammed into the wall.

“I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you I’ll kill you!” Monika shouted at a mile a minute as she wiped her lips clean. “I’ll kill you, dammit!”

She hadn’t used her gun throughout their entire duel, but she drew it now and shoved it in Thea’s face.

With her back against the wall, Thea slid to a seat on the ground.

She couldn’t move. She’d used up everything she had, and if Monika wanted to shoot her, she didn’t have the strength to stop her anymore. She would simply die and be branded a filthy traitor.

However, she wasn’t afraid. The fight was already decided.

“Goodness, are you really…”

Her voice rang loud and clear.

“…in love?”

Monika froze.

Her body was so stiff it was like time itself had stopped.

“………You…” Words dribbled from her mouth. She was barely coherent. “Did you—?”

Seeing her agitation was so funny that Thea let out a chuckle.

At long last, she had finally touched Monika’s heart.

Now she knew the secret that Monika had kept concealed behind so many walls. She knew what made her tick.

“Were there hints I overlooked, I wonder? The romance novels, maybe? No, I suppose not.” Thea shook her head as she thought back on Monika’s actions. “You went out of your way to hide it so completely that no one would ever notice your precious love. And why? Well, that’s simple. It was because the other person was someone close by.”

She had successfully met Monika’s eyes for three seconds, and doing so had revealed an emotion she never would have expected from her.

All that time, Monika had been hiding desire deep within her heart.

Monika’s face flushed in despair.

“Wow, you actually look like a human being for once. I think it’s a lovely look on you.”

Then Thea pounded the final nail in her coffin.

“The person you love is someone in Lamplight, isn’t it?”

Monika let out a quiet murmur. “I’ll kill you…” The words spilled feebly from her mouth.

But Thea was past being afraid of her threats.

“No, you won’t. After all, think of how sad that would make them.”

Monika’s words were nothing more than a negotiation tactic.

She had no intention whatsoever of killing Thea. There was no point in taking her threats seriously.

“That’s why you wanted to get rid of Matilda. It was so you could protect Lamplight, the place your crush called home. If we helped her out, Lamplight could come under fire for aiding an Imperial spy.”

The reason Monika had been so insistent that they turn Matilda in was simple.

Thea had assumed that her decision had simply been cold and calculated, but that wasn’t it at all. All that time, Monika’s sole priority had been one single member of their team.

That was what drove her to act as rationally as she could to ensure Lamplight’s survival.

Thea nodded. “You’re really single-minded in your love, aren’t you?”

The moment the words left her mouth, Monika leaped at her and grabbed Thea’s throat to forcibly shut her up.

Then she squeezed down with a rage far beyond anything she’d shown earlier.

“Stop that!” she barked threateningly. “Stop doing whatever you want with my heart!”

Her voice was halfway between a bellow and shriek.

When Monika loosened her grip on Thea’s throat, Thea readily agreed.

“Of course. You won’t hear another word out of me.” Monika had gone to great lengths to hide her love; Thea wanted to honor that decision. “But I need your help.”

“………”

“I have nothing but respect for your feelings. Now, I’m asking you to consider mine.” She went on. “What would the person you care about want? Do you think they would really approve of leaving Matilda to die?”

“………………………”

Monika went silent. After letting go of Thea’s neck, she simply stood there, stock-still.

If Monika refused to play along, Thea would have no choice but to use her love against her and blackmail her with it. Doing that ran the risk of sending Monika into such a rage that she would kill Thea, but if she did that, then having committed fratricide would prevent her love from ever bearing fruit.

The two of them were on equal footing. They had fought, they had butted heads directly, and at long last, they had finally reached even ground.

“………………………………………………Shit.”

At the end of the protracted silence, a frustrated murmur reached Thea’s ears.

It was so faint that if she hadn’t been listening closely, she might not have caught it at all.

“I have conditions.” Monika let out a long exhale and raised a single finger. “One, you don’t tell anyone else about my secret.”

“Of course. I won’t bring it up again, and I won’t try to figure out who it is.”

Thea was curious, of course, but she was just going to have to live with that.

Monika raised a second finger. “Two, if it looks like the army is going to catch on to what you’re doing, I’m turning Matilda over on the spot. This one is nonnegotiable. I have to protect Lamplight.”

“Please, be my guest.” If anything, Thea would rather that Monika kept an eye on them.

Monika raised a third finger. “Three.”

“That seems like a lot of conditions.”

“…About that.”

“Hmm?”

At that point, Monika started to get evasive. “I mean, it’s kinda… Well, you get it.”

“I’m afraid I really don’t. What is it? You’re going to have to make yourself clearer.”

Monika’s cheeks went ever so slightly flush.

Eventually, she awkwardly got the words out.

“……………Look, just don’t tell anyone you kissed me, all right?”

It took everything Thea had not to burst into laughter.

Getting to hear Monika talk in that kind of tone wasn’t something that happened every day.

“I’ll take it into consideration.”

“You want to get back to that fight, then?”

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding. If I had to fight you again, I’m sure I would end up in the ground.”

“If you can agree to those three conditions…” Monika took a breath. “…then fine, I’ll surrender.”

She raised her hands in the air.

“Magnificent.”

For some reason, she chose to mimic Klaus.

Thea let out a long breath and looked up at the night sky. All the exhaustion was hitting her at once.

She didn’t feel like she’d surpassed Monika. Not one bit.

It had taken painstaking preparation, a specific time and place, and a favorable set of circumstances, and even then, all Thea had been able to do was bring Monika to the negotiation table. Even during the height of their battle, Monika clearly hadn’t been giving it her all.

However, Thea’s heart was full to bursting with all sorts of emotions.

She had finally taken a win off of Monika, and for now, that would have to do.

Thea and Monika headed back to their hotel walking side by side.

As they did, Monika muttered a brief comment. “Honestly, I wasn’t even the right person for the job.” Thea didn’t understand what she meant. She looked over at Monika, and Monika elaborated a little. “Klaus already said it, but differences between allies really are the key to a good team. I know that as well as anyone. The problem is, none of us in Lamplight have a ruthless bone in our bodies.”

“You might be right about that.”

“We’re too soft. The fact of the matter is: I should be the one putting a stop to all this—personal feelings be damned.”

“………”

“Even if it meant I had to break your legs.”

“Couldn’t you come up with a nicer way to stop me?”

“This is going to bite us in the ass someday,” Monika muttered. “Eventually, we’ll run into an opponent who takes advantage of how soft we are.”

Her fears were legitimate. Now that they’d gotten this far, Thea could calmly take her analysis for what it was worth. This wasn’t Monika being rude, it was her genuinely pointing out a shortcoming they had as a team.

Thea was well aware of how far off she was from the model of a “standard” spy.

Furthermore, she had a hard time imagining any of her teammates being able to kill someone without hesitation, either. As far as weaknesses went, that was a pretty serious one.

When Klaus wasn’t there, someone needed to be able to step up and harden their heart where the others couldn’t.

For now, though, there was only one thing Thea had to say.

“The thing is, Monika, I don’t think the role of bad guy suits you all that well.”

“Excuse me?” Monika snapped in irritation. “And why’s that?”

“Because I’ve seen what’s in your heart. You’re no good at squashing your emotions.”

There was no way Monika could ever truly become cruel. Try as she might, her true emotions would always end up leaking back through.

She had tried so, so hard to conceal her single-minded love.

Anyone who held an emotion that strong wouldn’t be able to help themselves from empathizing with people.

“Back at the restaurant, you went out of your way to help Annette get dressed up nicely. Say what you like, you’ll never be able to get rid of that compassion.”

Monika sped up her pace in embarrassment.

“…Yeah, and that’s why we have such a problem,” Thea heard her mutter gloomily.

By the sound of it, keeping her emotions fully in check was a task beyond even her.

When the two of them got back to their hotel room, they found their previously sleeping teammates, Annette and Erna, wide awake.

Hearing them leave the room earlier had woken them up. They must have been pretty worried, as for once, they were sitting peacefully on the bed without so much as quarreling.

“Big Sis Thea, Big Sis Monika!” Erna said the moment she spotted them. “Are you okay?”

Beside her, Annette just stared at them in nervous silence.

Thea gave them the gentlest smile she could muster.

“Everything’s fine. Monika agreed to help us save Matilda.”

Annette cheered and leaped at Monika. “Yay! Sis!”

Monika nimbly evaded her assault. “Quit trying to jump on me; I’m in a bad mood.”

“Come on, don’t be shy! I wanna give you a kiss, yo!”

“I’ve gone through enough trauma for one evening already, thanks.”

When Annette started making a kissy face, Monika redoubled her efforts to get away from her. The two of them went on a wild rampage around the room, but something told Thea that the two of them were more compatible than they let on.

Soon they would embark on an operation to save Matilda.

However, there was one thing Thea need to check first. As things stood, Erna was under no obligation to take part in the steps to come.

When she conveyed that thought aloud—

“I have a condition, too.”

—Erna gave her reply.

“Is giving conditions some sort of fad these days?”

Thea had just finished doing the same thing to Monika.

Erna briskly thrusted her index finger forward. “Annette, you have to stop bullying me.”

She pointed at Annette, who was still trying to plant her lips on Monika.

“If you can do that…and if you start being my f-f-friend, then I’ll help, too.”

By the end, Erna was talking a mile a minute.

“……………”

After zoning out in confusion for a bit, Annette cocked her head to the side. “I thought we were friends this whole time, though.”

“………!”

Erna’s face reddened.

It looked like she would be joining the operation as well.

At five o’clock the next morning, the four girls headed to Matilda’s hotel.

Fortunately, she hadn’t been caught yet.

However, a dirt-cheap hotel room was no place to hold a clandestine discussion. They took Matilda back to a secluded spot on the coastline.

Thea and the others were supposed to have gone home already, and Matilda blinked at them in surprise upon discovering that they were still in town.

Annette was the one who broke the ice.

“Mom, you have to retire as a spy.”

Naturally, Matilda froze in shock. “What…?”

“Annette is right. We need you to promise you’ll quit.” Thea was done second-guessing herself. “As you might have surmised, the four of us are spies working for the Republic.”

“So wait, we’re…competitors?”

“Exactly. We can’t lend a hand to an enemy spy, even if they’re the mother of a friend. You need to retire, effective immediately. If you can promise us that, we’ll help you get over the border.”

Matilda’s mouth hung slightly agape as she let out a delighted sigh. That must have come as a great relief to her. When she noticed how harsh Thea’s gaze was, though, she quickly cast her eyes downward.

“But…how? Do you have secret connections, or—?”

“Nope. We’re going to be doing it the hard way.”

Their lives would have been so much easier if they had someone on the inside like that.

Here, the only people they had to rely on were each other. They couldn’t even get Klaus or their other teammates involved.

“The plan is simple: The five of us are going to break through the army’s siege.”

As Matilda stared at her dumbfoundingly, Thea told her when and where she needed to be for the plan to start, then left.

After they walked a short way, Monika shot her a question to double-check something. “So you didn’t end up telling Klaus about the situation?”

“Of course not.” Thea laughed. “He would never go along with something like this.”

Monika shrugged. “He’s probably pretty worried about us, then. It’s morning, and we still aren’t back.”

Thea nodded.

She’d considered calling Klaus and making up some excuse for their tardiness, but she’d ultimately decided against it. With his intuition, he’d be able to see through any lie she told him. The only way to keep Matilda safe was to not call him at all.

“Then he’ll just have to be worried,” Thea replied. “It’s time for us to disappear.”

Monika nodded. “That’s harsh. But you know what? I can get behind it.”

Erna smiled. “The four of us will go missing.”

Annette hummed a little tune. “We’re like lost children, yo.”

And with that, the girls disappeared so they could go on their secret mission—the mission that not even their teacher could know about.

It was early in the morning, and the sun was just starting to crest the horizon.

A long, long day was about to start in the entertainment district.

It was five AM when the girls decided to help Matilda escape.

They had no way of knowing it, but Klaus and Lily would reach the station at noon.

And there was something else they had no way of knowing as well.

At three PM, Klaus’s warning to Welter was going to come true—a villain would arrive at the city’s port.